But I Won't Do That
Amy walked into her chambers and hung her robe in the closet. She had some time before she had to take the bench that morning. Her goal had been to get away from the craziness in her house, but it felt like she'd brought it with her as she sat at her desk and stared at the pile of work in front of her. She had intended to finish the work the previous night, but things just didn't come together for her. When she got home Lauren needed to be picked up from Taylor's house and the laundry needed to be done. Peter and Vincent were out doing whatever brothers did, and her mother was nowhere to be found until, of course, it was time for dinner; which nobody had prepared but everyone came home expecting to be ready. On top of that she had a splitting headache and the desire to lock herself, and everybody else, in their rooms so that she could have a few minutes of quiet. The stack seemed enormous and Amy couldn't imagine getting through all the cases she needed to review. Things were supposed to get easier in her life now that she was in a relationship and Lauren was older. Why didn't that happen?
"Why is everything so complicated?" she whined out loud before walking over to her couch and lying down with a file pressed to her chest. The door swung open and Amy jumped into a sitting position, fumbling with the file she'd been holding.
The tall, dark man walked in and smugly said, "Judge Gray, I don't think that osmosis is going to work on that case."
Throwing him an annoyed look she responded, "I was resting my eyes."
He looked back at her and scoffed, then nodded as he reminded her, "We've got a lot of cases to get through this morning Judge Gray and I think you're going to need all your strength and patience to deal with your docket." He paused slightly, looking at her lean into the couch. "Five minutes, Judge Gray."
Waving him off, Amy stood and stretched her neck before walking back to her desk. What a nightmare this day was going to be. It was unbelievable that she had even thought she could get through the day without any sort of stress so that she'd be refreshed for her date with David McClaren. Walking to her closet she pulled on her robe and headed for the door. Just then Bruce walked back through the door, almost directly over her.
"Sorry Judge Gray, but we've got to get going, the parties are getting restless." He said while leading her out the door.
"Yah, yah, yah," she responded sarcastically. This was going to be a long day. Donna looked especially keyed up as Amy walked into the courtroom. Giving her a look to say 'cool it', she took her seat and looked out over her courtroom. It was going to be an incredibly hectic day with the Cochran's already up in arms. It couldn't have been more than a month since she'd last had them battling in her courtroom. It was almost always the same thing, 'he said, she said' with the two of them. One parent would chastise the other and all of this somehow ended up in her courtroom, on her docket. It seemed, sometimes, to Amy that they had fights just to punish her. Crossly she banged her gavel, "Enough! I swear if it's not one thing it's another with you two. Now we haven't even started and I'm already about to put ALL of you," she said motioning at the lawyers as well, "into jail. Now just sit down and keep quiet until I tell you to talk!"
"Judge Gray…" the lawyers butted in as their clients began arguing again.
"Did everyone miss the part where I asked for quiet?" she was nearly furious as Donna crept up behind her and tapped her on the shoulder. "What is it Donna?"
"Judge Gray… I… well… it's just… sorry to interrupt, but you have a call from Lauren's school. They said they need to talk to you right now." Donna quivered and stumbled over the words. It seemed that she couldn't do anything right, and she didn't want to upset her mentor, the woman who's living room she'd given birth in.
Amy walked into her chambers in a bad mood that had carried over from the court room and picked up the phone with a short, "This is Judge Gray." After listening to the incompetent man on the other line she hung up the phone before burying herself on the desk. Her small frame sunk into the chair and her facial features disappeared as her hair spilled out over the papers lying on the less then organized desk. The man, Lauren's vice principal, was calling her to ask if she could chaperone a school dance. She could not believe that this would be considered an emergency and was furious that he had chosen to call her over the hundreds of other parents whose children attended the school. Bouncing her feet off the ground as a young child would do when throwing a temper tantrum, she hardly noticed Bruce walk into the office. He looked down at her with a smirk on his dark face, thinking about what an interesting person she could be to work for. Nothing was ever the same on any given day, and he knew that those qualities in her were what made his job more tolerable.
"Judge Gray, the Cochran's are about to kill each other in there, maybe you better carry it over to Thursday." Looking down and trying to catch a glimpse of what she was thinking he began to repeat himself, "Judge Gray…"
"I know, Bruce. The parties are restless, the docket is falling apart, there are a million cases to get through and the apocalypse is coming!" she blurted out with a shrill tone in her voice. She was so frustrated that even listening to the calming words of her CSO was too much to handle. Putting up her hands to stop Bruce from talking she lifted her head from her desk and backpedaled, "I'm sorry, it's not your fault; I know I have to get back in there."
"Judge Gray, is there something going on with you today that I should be aware of? Something between you and McClaren." He inquired. He didn't like McClaren and was increasingly suspicious of the relationship he was trying to have with Judge Gray. Something just felt off about the man.
"Bruce! Just… just drop it okay? Let's go." She said as she pushed past him to reenter the courtroom and deal with the rest of her day. 'Today really sucks,' she thought to herself as she walked down the hall.